Rumours are going around about a possible new Apple product. Essentially a Macbook with a touch screen. Of course there have been tablet PCs for some time however they’ve never really taken off and this takes things a little further.

Apple seems to have the magic touch for opening up markets to the masses - MP3 players were hardly ten a penny before the iPod.

Everything seems to be moving towards this new “touch” interface - Microsoft Surface is another possibility but I’ve never been convinced that this is a mature product. I’ve never felt Microsoft are pushing this as a replacement for the reliable old mouse - hedging their bets just a tad.

I’ll be interested to see what appears on the scene.

Some people think applications in Facebook are great - I’m of the opinion that in the majority of cases they are a complete waste of my time. I welcomed the opportunity to block a particular application forever with open arms - no more do I have Funwall requests 50 times a day!

Since then it’s now even possible to block application requests from a particular friend - it’s always the same people. You know who you are!

However there are some useful applications out there and I do wonder if I’m sometimes missing out. This leads me to occasionally accept a request just to see what the application does. Quite a lot of the time it seems for an application to work I’ve got invite all my friends to use the application first. So application spam on Facebook has become very common.

Of course this is just application developers being inpatient about spreading their applications - good apps will always float to the top it just takes time so stop using spammy techniques!

However Facebook are now to provide a ranking system for applications - basically marking good apps as “Great apps”. Excellent saves my time - I won’t be trying anything out without this seal of approval from now on.

This also covers various other issues such as the use of personal details so hopefully this will roll out as quickly as possible - developers can have their applications vetted from September.

Facebook have talked for a while about a whole new layout and it’s finally available to the masses. Currently it’s still not the default layout for facebook.com but if you go to the direct URL for the new one you can give it a go.

Apart from the new 1024 pixel wide design which of course is the new standard online it really tries to separate those pesky applications! At last!

I’ll be giving it a good going over tonight - what are your thoughts on this new layout?

I’ve been in the opinion that if we are heading for a recession then working within the online World is going to insulate us or even might improve business. The reason I’ve thought this is doing business online is generally accepted as cheaper than traditional methods. Also the ability to track success and therefore calculate the return on investment is so easy online. This covers all sorts of areas such as advertising, eCommerce or marketing in general. As businesses will need to justify their expenditure more during hard times it seems online is the sensible option.

However details that Google’s results weren’t as high as expected got me a little more thoughtful about if my original opinion was correct.

The worrying figure initially for me was “The number of paid clicks on websites operated by Google and its partners fell 1% from the first quarter”. Not quite what I was expecting. However I then thought this through further.

The number of paid clicks is what the actual customers are clicking. You’d expect with the possibility of a recession people won’t be shopping as much so the number of clicks would drop. This would also tally with the idea that PPC is going to become increasing competitive as businesses fight for these precious clicks.

At this time we haven’t had client’s reporting any noticeable difference in cost for clicks but I think it’s coming.

As always it’s going to interesting to see how things pan out.